Not trans, just a narc

I get that there's a lot of shame in being trans, but I think that she just felt shame and attached it to something. She got to know a few trans people online and essentially decided that it was the right thing for her. No matter what, I supported her, if she wanted to stay a boy or become a woman, I was fine and also still rather attracted to her. When I asked her things about how she felt concerning her gender, she would say things like "I hate myself. I hate being a boy. Being a girl will be better than being what I am now." For a long time my ex would tell me things like, she doesn't feel like part of "the trans community" and that she didn't feel "trans enough". And after her final surgery, she said she didn't feel much different. She didn't feel any more like a woman. She still hated her body. The whole oh woe is me trip goes on and on... and I let her tell me as much as she "needed" to- to vent, to get sympathy and empathy (can we say supply?) and I mostly didn't try to poke what seemed to be an already pretty pathetic and volatile situation.

I try not to judge. I'm 'the last' person to try to put people in a box, but for real, I don't think my ex is trans. Her mother and sister don't think this either. I think the self hate and trying to escape it led her to believe that if she switched something as base as her gender that she might not feel the same self-loathing that she has always described to me, and also because I do think she has BPD as well, that this sense of being lost, unsure, this total lack of identity that she has eluded to, and sense of a lack of belonging to anything she has told me about, has made her look for something to belong to, which led to her latching onto IDing as trans.

I don't think there is any wrong reason to change genders, per se', I always answered the questions of "why" with "why does it matter?" Anything even as simple as "I just want to be a boy/girl" seems fair enough to me, but I am sort of sad that she hated herself so seriously that she felt a need to change her body like that. That really must suck.

Anyone else?????

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No one is a bottomless pit of giving, but some are bottomless pits of taking.

I have (had) a friend who transitioned from male to female. I say "had" because I could no longer absorb all the negativity and "woe is me" coming from her.

She is the only transgendered person I know personally, so I can't generalize. But she sounds a lot like your ex. She seemed to need something that wasn't her fault to blame for any and all problems.

The most sad thing of all is that transitioning didn't "solve" any of her problems, and today she seems just as anxious, negative and depressed as before her transition. I compare it to someone saying "all my problems would be solved if only I could....." Fill in the blank with lose weight, go back to college, have a baby, etc, only in her case it was transition to female.

Even as I'm writing this, I don't think this is a transgender thing - I think it's a human thing. Imagining that there is a magic "something" outside of ourselves that will solve all our problems.

I can see the kind of thing you are describing. Gender dysphoria is a complicated thing, and it's very hard to extract from other issues going on, if that's even needed. Someone close to me transitioned from male to female, and was a real mess before doing so. In her case, it definitely helped with some issues, but there were other ones that were unaffected because they were unrelated. The extreme difficulty of being a gender with which you don't identify can cause all kinds of collateral damage that doesn't just go away after transition, possibly including developing PD traits.

At this point, I have met quite a few transgender people, and being transgender and the associated discrimination is about the only thing they have in common. Every case is different; there is no "typical" presentation or transition. On account of this, I don't find it hard to believe that something like your description could be an accurate reading. Transgender folks can be PD, too.

I was fully supportive of my sib transitioning later in life. I only found out years afterwards ó through much mistreatment, misery, and disorientation, and only with the help of two licensed mental health professionals ó that it wasnít anything following the typical arc of the trans process, it was uPD (most likely narc).

Post-transition (meds, transition counseling, and surgery), my sib became increasingly cruel, manipulative, confrontational, verbally inappropriate, and obsessed not with healthily inhabiting their chosen gender, but how much they physically resembled our deceased parent of that gender.

Itís been a nightmare. Itís clearly rooted in psychopathology. Itís also completely unbroachable because any question or criticism, however gentle, would be angrily denounced as transphobia.

That remaining branch of the FOO is totally enmeshed in the drama; anyone aware but unable to break free is likely being held emotionally hostage. With professional help, I had to go NC with the whole group involved.

Itís taken me a few years of NC distance to realize how extensive the emotional damage has been and how long the PD traits have been in play (they preceded the trans process by decades). Itís also pretty clear that Iíve come through it with persistent C-PTSD symptoms. Iíve found a local therapist specializing in C-PTSD and am beginning therapy after the holidays.

Thank you, InHidingWithMacSeth, for bringing this up. Being manipulated by a uPDN sib by being called ďtransphobicĒ is a special kind of mindf*ck. Itís a clever kind of control, really, in that itís essentially unassailable.

I have a lot of trans women friends and one ex-friend who's a trans woman with BPD. Definitely gender dysphoria and PDs can occur in the same person--and that can make it hard to address the PD because of accusations like transphobia & how easy it is to keep playing a victim role. It sounds like in your situation, since this is your ex, it might not matter that much if she's really trans or not. That's a huge rabbit hole of a question and not something that people can really answer for each other. What does matter is you taking care of yourself.

My ex-friend who's a trans woman had to go pretty far into chaos in her life before I realized that it wasn't good for me to be in contact with her. I think for people who are trans and have PDs, it can be easy to think transition will fix more than it will. My best understanding of everything suggests that the rules for PDs are the same no matter what. You have to take care of yourself and your boundaries and know what you're willing to engage with.

For my trans women friends who don't have BPD or other PDs, transition seems to be pretty wonderful. Also I seem to remember in Kate Bornstein's memoir from a few years ago, "A Queer and Pleasant Danger," she talks about having BPD as a trans woman. She might be a good balance or role model for situations with trans women who have BPD.

Hey there. My spouse is trans (mtf). And I totally understand what you're saying. In fact, my wife's transition is almost verbatim what you've said your spouse went/is going through

It started out that she was hanging around an internet forum that was really LGBTQIA friendly. And one day she just decided to be a woman. She told me two days before she left for a military deployment. (How's that for dropping a bomb). I've been in shock, coping, and therapy for nearly two years now as a result.

My wife's 'woe as me' isms are really starting to grate on my nerves. I've tried to be the most supportive spouse as I can manage while dealing with and unpacking my own feelings. My wife often gets upset that I don't snap to and adjust to whatever change she's currently making. The negativity she's laying down feels as though it's threatening to drown me some days--and I have my own issues to deal with (chronic depression and anxiety disorders)--as the kids say, most days I "don't have enough spoons" to deal with it all.

With my wife, first it was she looked to male at the start. Then it was she wasn't transforming fast enough. Now we've moved onto literally repeatedly telling me how jealous she is of my anatomy and that hers isn't changing fast enough. She hates work, she hates going out, she hates pretty much every solution or offer of help I give her. This leaves me feeling emotionally exhausted most days and feeling like I'm both quickly running out of patience and a bad person.

Like you, I don't like putting labels on people and would be the last person to discriminate against anyone. There are days, though, that for as miserable as my wife always is, I am left wondering if she will ever truly achieve happiness because she's self-sabotaging and/or if she has a PD. Right now, I'm solely focused on trying to maintain my sanity in this sea of toxicity.

Thanks for posting this. Although it made me ask more questions than I had answers for, it was a good position to look closely at my life and, hopefully, find some resolution that doesn't involve divorce.